


Black Binder

by disquisitemind



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Alternate Universe, Emotional Manipulation, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-05
Updated: 2016-10-05
Packaged: 2018-08-19 15:51:30
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8215444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/disquisitemind/pseuds/disquisitemind
Summary: “Where’s your man?”  Julian snorts through his nose, “I’m early, if you must know.”  She hums and leans forward, quietly whispering, “Not your day,” her head flicks to  the corner table where his coat sits on the back of his chair, “Not your table. You poppin’ the question or something?”





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is some kind of AU where there is Coffee shops, rewards programs, and deep space nine. Don't ask me how.

Julian clutches the sienna wallet in his hands, his binder digging painfully in his side as he grips the brown suitcase with a heavy hand. The cafe isn’t loud, per se, the music present enough to cloud their conversation from any listening ears and curious bystanders when the time arrives. He already chose his spot, a different seating arrangement from their usual table- two older men already using their old space for a series of short chess matches. He imagines they sit there every Tuesday, playing the same games over and over in quick succession. A clear loser and winner each game because neither plays to _tie_. That isn’t the way their rules work. A part of him begrudgingly wishes he checked the Tuesday tables before he made arrangements, but as he walks up to the counter to place his order, he accepts that this could play into his favor. Different is good. _This difference_ would be his first move. Not that Garak will know. Not that he can ever know.

This needs to be perfect.

“And for you, Sir?”

Julian snaps up from his stupor, the shift displacing the binder digging into his underarm. He pushes his arms together to catch it before it falls, unbalanced and still dreadfully nervous. He needs to get his fucking act together before Garak shows up. Setting the wallet on the counter, he openes it with one hand and slips his card out of one of the pockets. “Just a black coffee, thanks, Tee.”

She nods and accepts the card with an easy, uninterested grace. Swiping it through, she begins, as the obvious manager inches forward behind the corner, “Would you like to hear about our new rewards program?” Without waiting for him to answer, she continues, her mouth moving at a speed most rappers would envy, “If you sign up today, you can get fifteen percent off your next purchase. The rewards program allows you to gain points every purchase. Once you acquire 1500 points you receive a free beverage on us.”

He sighs and asks, even though he doesn't care for the answer, “How many points so I get with each purchase?”

Tesharia’s eyes dim further as she recites, “Every purchase is one point, sir. If I could have your name, phone number and zip-code I could sign you up.” To make 1500 purchases one would have to buy a lot of coffee. Stopping in everyday would yield him a free beverage after...about four years. All in all, not a terrible investment. He would be here in four years, might as well get a free cup of coffee out of it.

“Alright,” he says, making it sound begrudging, as she slides the card back to him. “Sign me up.” She types a few things into the touchscreen monitor with a quick practiced ease as he recites the requested information.

Slipping him the 15% off coupon, Tesharia smiles with her teeth, a quick uptake of lips that could have been mistaken for ingenuine, except for the fact that Julian has been coming here with Garak for three years, and Tesharia isn’t one for pacifying grins. “Where’s your man?”

Julian snorts through his nose, “I’m early, if you must know.”

She hums and leans forward, quietly whispering, “Not your day,” her head flicks to the corner table where his coat sits on the back of his chair, “Not your table. You poppin’ the question or something?”

He holds up a finger against his lips in a shushing motion and a quick smile, then plucks his wallet up from the counter along with his card. Tesharia giggles against her hands, as he walks towards his seat.

This will work.

A few minutes after Julian sets up the table, Garak stumbles into the coffee shop, shaking his umbrella and smoothing down his hair. Julian keeps to his seat, although his legs beg to stand and greet him. Garak mentally scans the shop, and Julian waves from his chair, a quick yoo-hoo wave that beckons Garak to the table rather than the counter.

“Doctor Bashir,” Garak greets as he weaves around the two older gentlemen, “my dear, you are early.”

“A whole day early.” Julian replies, because it would be suspicious of him not to acknowledge it. _Be cool, be charming._

“Yes, I did notice that it wasn’t Wednesday. I’ll admit that I’m curious.” Garak’s eyes flicker down to the black binder artistically placed in the middle of the table. “My,my- am I here for business or for pleasure?”

Julian inclines his head, and gestures towards the seat across from him. “I have a favor.”

Garak sits, piling his things on the back of the chair. Looking at Julian suspiciously, he pulls the black binder toward him. He moves to open it, but Julian stops him, his hand shooting out and slamming on the cover. Garak looks him over and clicks his tongue. “You are being strangely secretive,” he says, taking his hands off the offending binder. “Usually that’s my area of expertise.”

“Well I imagine you get a lot of practice,” Julian begins, a well worn conversation that will put Garak at immediate ease. It was their favorite game, after all. “Being, perhaps...a secret agent...or an assassin...or a secret agent assassin.”

“You’re imagination runs away with you, doctor. I am nothing but a mere gardener.” Garak’s eyes are still trained on the black book. After a moment, he looks up at Julian, “Do you care to elaborate?”

Julian holds out a hand for the binder, which Garak hands over, suspect. “My favor.” He says simply, and Garak nods, not understanding. This is what he rehearsed, and Garak will be able to see if it’s false. He knows Julian in that way. A way that Julian is now, eternally ungrateful for. Failure isn’t an option. This has to be perfect.

“I’m madly in love with you.” Julian says, and this is the easiest part. Not because he said it over and over to his mirror refection hours earlier, but because it’s the truth. The words sound almost strange now, not really like words at all. Like a color or a feeling, and so he ad-libs, “Passionately and obsessively in love.” That feels better. Garak doesn’t move or react and Julian knows this isn’t because what he’s saying is surprising or unbelievable. It’s because Garak already knows how he feels and the fucker loves that he can make him say it. He loves that Julian wants to say it, over and over again, because Julian loves the feeling of their relationship explained so crisply on his tongue. Julian doesn’t wait for him to reply, because he knows he won’t. Instead he continues, “With this in mind, I want you to help me.” He slides the binder back over to Garak, who he knows, is itching to open it. “I want you to burn this.”

“And this is?”

“Can’t say.”

“How utterly suspicious.” Garak’s eyes flicker between the binder and Julian, shoulders not quite inching forward, but the intent is there. Julian knows that this will work because, just as Garak knows him, Julian knows Garak. What was that phrase? Curiosity killed the lizard? “Please tell me it’s not another rendition of your paltry verse? Poetry was never your strong suit.” Garak studies his face, waiting for a reaction, but Julian holds steady.

And then Julian smiles, toothily, in a grin and bear it sort of way, and says innocently, “I thought you liked my poetry.”

Garak doesn’t rise to the dig, which is only somewhat surprising. Garak always hated Julian’s verse, that is, until Julian was pumping inside him, in long deep movements- Julian whispering his paean in Garak’s ear, depraved and shameless.

It is tacitly understood that Julian’s poetry was a major turn on for Garak- that pontifical slut.

“I suppose if you are giving this binder to me, it can’t be that important.”

“Oh you are completely right. It’s not all that important,” Julian agrees, because he knows Garak hates it. Agreement isn’t fun, agreement isn’t challenging. Agreement is restful.

“Still, you are asking me to _burn_ it. You don’t burn something unimportant. You shred it, or crumple it, or forget its existence altogether. What would be the point in burning it?”

Julian nods intently, “You bring up a very good point. Why _indeed_.”

Garak huffs and crosses his arms, pursing his lips in an attempt to glean Julian’s intention by all this. This charade, as Julian would call it. Hopefully, Garak hasn't figured that part out yet. “You are toying with me.” Garak says, and some may think, _Dammit Julian, the jig is up. He’s figured it out._ Julian knows better. Garak says just this because, dammit, he’s figured nothing out and he’s just so gosh darn mad about it, he wants Julian to think that this is Garak’s game. That Garak is the one in charge of the rules here.

Again, Julian knows better.

Let Garak think what he thinks. “Yeah, a bit.” Julian says with a put upon sigh, as if this is difficult for him to say. “I’m sorry, I’m just so embarrassed.” Garak is still unconvinced, if the tenseness of his jaw is anything to go by. Julian has to fix this. Flattery? _Garak you know me too well._ Garak loves praise, loves being right, loves servility to his stunning intellect. But...there is something in the air, something above the binder between them that tells Julian- Tells him that false compliments will not get him far. Julian would have to give him something.

“They’re love letters,” Julian lies, story already coming into place.

“To me, I’m assuming?” Garak says, no longer looking at Julian at all, eyes tacked onto the binder like a hawk.

“Who else?”

“And you want me to burn them-”

“Because I want to move on.” Julian lies, again. And Garak doesn’t seem to be catching on that he ought to believe what Julian is saying. He doesn’t seem to be listening that much at all really. Fuck, Julian recognizes that Garak doesn’t like to be _played_. He has to give him something real.

Humiliation is the sadist’s fellatio.

“I can’t move on with them in the house. I entertained Leeta last night,” Julian says, which is true. “I kept thinking about you, and I couldn’t perform- Couldn’t even get hard.”

Also true.

Garak is much less interested in the binder now, eyes flicking back up to Julian, not even attempting to look apologetic. Julian’s cheeks burn with the truth of it, half sure that the two older men playing chess heard his admittance, and were trying their damndest not to acknowledge that they did. “It happens to the best of us, my dear,” Garak says, fully relishing the way Julian’s skin prickles with mortification. “I’ll admit, that my sexual exploits haven’t been as much fun as of late. Of course, I can still perform,” Garak reassures him, just to be a dick. “But you and I? We share a certain chemistry, don’t we?”

“We _did_.” This isn’t in the script, but he can’t help saying it. It slips out like a last breath, weightless and damning. Garak only smirks. _God, we need fucking therapy_ , Julian thinks, hating him, for a moment. Julian takes a deep breath, reining himself in. He has lived with this man, he proposed to him, goddammit. Julian knows a wall when he see’s one.

Behind Garak’s stupid, self-satisfied smirk, the man is discontent. Garak wants him back the same way that Julian wants Garak. Why else would he be here? Garak already knows how to get a quick fuck from him if he so damn pleases. No. Garak wants something different. His curiosity, his posturing, stems from a place deep down inside that Julian likes to call his _no-no place_. (That’s where Garak’s feelings are.)

Garak compartamilizes and not in the way where, this school memory is on this shelf, and oh if you look over there, you can find Tain and Mila dancing on his mum’s 40th birthday. No, Garak likes to take all of it, and put it in a box, and lock it. Then, he puts it in a bigger box, and he locks that. And so on and so on, until basically he’s a living breathing Matryoshka doll. All Julian’s past girlfriends had one phrase in common, _You wore me down_. Julian is wearing Garak down, and it is now that Julian realizes that he gambled right. This is going to fucking work, not because Julian wants it to. But because Garak does.

Suddenly this becomes much easier. “I can’t be with you anymore, I can’t fuck you anymore, I can’t do this.”

“This?”

“Lunches, dinner dates, seeing you, talking to you. I’m thinking about transferring, permanently. I’m still young, I can still make my career somewhere else. And, I don’t want to make you move, I know how much you love it here.” Garak hates it on DS9, says so whenever he get’s the chance. “I guess I’m just here to say goodbye.”

Garak is unbelievably still.

In an abrupt movement, Garak snags the binder on the table and opens it. Julian doesn’t stop him. Giving Garak a chance to look, Julian says, “They’re copies, of my transfer papers.” That was the only copy. “I already handed in my resignation to Captain Sisko.” That was laughable. “I want you to burn them. I want you to see it, so that you know it’s real. Then, I want you to burn it. So that you can have some closure.” Give Garak closure?

As if.

Garak is still reading them, back to back, cover to cover. “Is this real?” He asks finally, voice quiet amongst the cafe.

Oh god no. “Yeah.”

“Nothing would change your mind?”

A month earlier, a couple days before Julian stupidly proposed and put them in this god-forsaken mess, Garak’s cock was buried deep in Julian’s ass, one hand gripped tight around Julian’s throat the other around his cock. Julian can still remember the feeling of Garak’s cool room paneling against his cheek, the rough grain of the faux wood pressed against his face as Garak’s lips brushed his ear. “You are mine.” Garak said, voice broken and raw. “I know every part of you. You cannot run, you cannot hide anymore. We are twisted as one.”

In more ways than one.

Julian thinks that if Garak says that, right there, Julian might give up this charade. Why, he might just get on his knees and beg for Garak’s cock right then and there in the coffee shop, just as he did that night.

“Nothing.” He says.

Garak is silent for a moment, binder slack in his hands as he regards Julian. And- this is the good part. This is where Garak finally gives in. This is where they get what they want.

“You’re that mad?” Garak asks, and Julian perks up.

_Wait, what?_

“Why are you doing this?” Garak continues, slapping the binder on the table briskly, “Why are you giving this to me? Have I offended you that much?” Julian presses little half crescents into his palm, trying to remember if he prepared for this. “I wasn’t ready, Julian.”

“Yes we were.” And this isn’t apart of the script, but dammit, he’s losing him.

“I still love you,” Garak says, softly, “No games, no pretense. If marriage is what you want-” And Julian does. “-Then that is what we will do.”

“This is the worst proposal I’ve ever seen.” Julian says, crossing his arms, “When I proposed, I at least wore something nice.”

Garak laughs- a small chuckle that fights it’s way up from his abdomen, then his throat, and jaw, and lips, all the way to his eyes. Breathtaking, that would be the word. “Do you want me to propose or not?”

Julian pretends to think, “Sure, I do. A couple different times. Different places, different mood. So I can pick which story I like better.”

Garak considers this for a moment, “You want me to surprise you?”

“It isn’t a bloody proposal if it isn’t a bloody surprise now is it? C’mon Garak, you have to work for it.”

“I thought I just did.”

Julian stands, and gathers up his things, and then walks around the table to press a kiss to Garak’s forehead, “The works just starting, love.”

As he turns to leave, Garak catches his arm, hand trailing down to twine his hand with Julian’s, “Who won?”Julian considers him for a moment, then smiles graciously.

_We’ll call this one a tie._

Garak smiles back.


End file.
